


Nerds in Love

by Awseomness



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: A-spec Pidge, Almost certainly not s8 compliant, Close examination of feelings, F/F, Fluff, I don't think it goes quite as far as pining, Lesbian Leifsdottir, Mutual Disasters, Mutual Smittenness, mutual awkwardness, s7 compliant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-10
Updated: 2018-09-10
Packaged: 2019-07-10 11:51:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,137
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15948779
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Awseomness/pseuds/Awseomness
Summary: While Pidge is still recovering, she and Leifsdottir start working together on making the MegaFlex Exofighters better machines. They end up meshing better than either of them expected. Their friends are very supportive.(Inspired in part by this tumblr post)





	Nerds in Love

Boredom was not an unfamiliar feeling for Pidge. It wasn't arrogant to say that she had an exceptional mind that needed constant simulation, any more than it would be arrogant to say that Lance was an excellent shot, or that Hunk was a wonderful friend, or that Keith was a stellar pilot. Pidge's brilliance was a fact, as was the fact that lying in a hospital bed with books she'd already read and puzzles she'd already solved was completely boring.  
She was about to reach for an already finished sudoku book, planning to erase her work and pretend the puzzle was new, when the door to her hospital room opened up.

Stepping in - tall, thin, and freckled - was Ina Leifsdottir. In the (apparently FOUR!) years that had passed on Earth since Pidge and her friends has become the Paladins of Voltron, Ina had become one of Earth's four most elite pilots, chosen to pilot one of the MegaFlex Exofighters Pidge's father had designed. She had also grown much taller, and cut her hair.

"Sergeant Holt." She said as she approached, "It's good to see you're recovering."

Pidge's face screwed up. "Sergeant? Pretty sure I was a cadet. And then went AWOL for four years."

"In recognition of your service, and in the expectation that you will continue fighting on behalf of the Earth, you've been officially recognized as a ranking flight officer. The paperwork was finalized earlier this week."

"I think I'm gonna have a talk with Coran." Pidge said, her eyebrows lowering, "See where a Paladin ranks in the Altean military. Might be higher." She glanced at the datapad under Ina's arm. "You didn't come here just to tell me that, did you?"

Ina shook her head and held out the datapad. Pidge took it and turned it on. A three-dimensional hologram display erupted from the pad, portraying the design schematics of the MegaFlex Exofighter, as well as multiple screens of design and performance notes.

Wide-eyed, Pidge looked back at Ina.

"Captain Shirogane asked me to bring this to you." She explained. "Given that you have more experience with extraterrestrial technology, any insights you have would be greatly appreciated. That said, I believe he just thought you'd like the chance to go over the designs."

Pidge grinned widely. "Thanks, Ina! I haven't had a chance to check these out in detail, and I have been _dying_ with nothing to do. You're a life saver!"  
Ina didn't respond, just glanced away.

Enraptured, Pidge didn't take her eyes away from the hologram when she said, "If you get the chance, you should bring this to Hunk, too. I'm sure he's enjoying his rest, but he'll have some insight too."

Ina lingered for a moment before nodding, then turning to leave.

***

"Do they turn into robots like the Atlas does?"

Leifsdottir shook her head.

"Aww." Garrett visibly deflated. "That would be so Robotech, though!"

"I was... also disappointed about that."

"I mean, there's still a chance, right? Like, we didn't know the Atlas could do that. Maybe if we stick enough quintessence in them, the MFEs'll transform too."

Leifsdottir glanced at the person still sitting at Garrett's side, a Balmeran Garrett had introduced as Shay. She - which was the pronoun Garrett had used and Shay did not reject - looked with interest but without full comprehension at the schematics now projected. When Garrett spoke, she smiled, and she seemed more interested in him than in the MFEs.

Only four years ago, Earth had never met an extraterrestrial species, now it was being rebuilt by many. It was difficult not to feel that Earth would be better off if none had ever come, since it was the Galra who razed it. Difficult, but correct. Humanity was going to join the universal stage, or it would disappear without a trace. The Voltron Coalition was a good thing, and Leifsdottir was glad for it.

"You've got the megathrusters connected directly to the dynotherms." Garrett said, now looking closer. "Right off the bat, you're gonna want a bimetal autolinkage between them. It's safer and more fuel efficient."

"Oh, we have some of those!" Shay brightened, "I can have them brought to the garrison immediately."

Garrett smiled at her, "You're the best, Shay."

The door opened and another Balmeran whom Leifsdottir did not recognize stepped in. They looked sheepish, insofar as their expressions resembled humans'.

"Sorry to interrupt," they said, "but grandmother has something she needs Shay for."

"Oh. Of course." Shay stood, then bent down to place a kiss on Garrett's cheek before hurrying out of the room.

Leifsdottir took a moment to choose her next words before speaking. "You've made some close friends in space."

"Oh yeah, Shay's great."

"Is it the same for all of you?"

"Yeah, kinda. I mean, Lance had that thing with Nyma, and that thing with Plaxum, and he'll deny it but he's obviously still in love with Allura. And then Keith's got something with Acxa, but between you and me I'm not convinced she isn't his sister or something."

"...And Holt?"

"What, Pidge? Naw." Garrett laughed. "I mean, there's Beezer, but I don't think that was romantic. Pidge doesn't really do relationships, you know?"

Leifsdottir's face fell almost imperceptibly. "I see."

***

Team Voltron met regularly during their time in the hospital, often including Shiro, Coran, Romelle, etc, but just as often only the five paladins. Allura found the amount of time they were expected to rest to be excessive, after all a few days in a healing chamber should leave them all ready for action, but the Garrison insisted they rest and recover mentally as well as physically.

This afternoon, it was the core five, sitting together in the cafeteria, slightly off-schedule so they were alone. Some days they discussed the recent events regarding the rebuilding of Earth or news about the war. Today, however...

"Pidge, I'm just saying: Graphics Interchange Format. Graphics. That's a hard g."

"Hunk, for crying out loud, no other acronym works like that. If someone makes a file format, they get to name it, and it's pronounced 'jiff'."

"I'm inclined to agree with Pidge." Allura said. "I'm still learning your alphabet, but 'jiff' sounds better than 'ghif'."

"What are you talking about?" Lance threw his arms up. "It's a 'G'! It says 'guh'. Girl, gift, giraffe, ghif."

"...Wait." Pidge turned her full focus to Lance. "Do you pronounce 'giraffe' with a hard-g?"

"Yeah. Because that's how you pronounce 'giraffe'." Lance glanced around, slightly nervous. "Doesn't everybody?"

Allura shrugged, Pidge shook her head, Hunk gave a noncommital hand gesture.

"Everyone in my family does." Lance said, quieter.

Hunk turned to Keith, "Keith? You're the tie-breaker."

Having finished his meal, Keith sat with his arms crossed and his eyes closed. Evidently, he did not find arguments about the pronunciation of dead filetypes as stimulating as the rest of them. "Can we please change the subject."

There was quiet then for a moment before Hunk spoke up again, "So our classmates got really hot, right?"

There was a palpable sigh of relief from all.

"Oh my god, THANK YOU!" Lance's shoulders relaxed.

"Right?!" Pidge agreed.

Even Allura nodded.

"Like, Ryan's all tall now," Hunk continued, "and his features are so chiseled. He used to have those cheeks, remember? Now it's no cheeks, all cheebone."

"And Nadia's wearing glasses now. When did that happen?" Lance said. "Do you think she needs them, or just wears them because she knows how she looks in them?"

"Speaking of tall, Ina filled out." Pidge offered. "I feel like she could lift me no problem. Plus she got a haircut. Suits her way better than the bun."

"Veronica is rather fetching, isn't she?" Allura joined in.

"What? No. You're not allowed to say that." Lance shot her a look.

"Why not?"

"That's my sister! No one here is allowed to be attacted to my sister. Uh-uh. Off limits. I mean, how would Pidge feel if I said her brother was hot?"

"Fine?" Pidge raised an eyebrow.

"And James..." Keith mumbled.

"What?" Everyone turned to look at Keith, who only just then realized he'd said that out loud. He coughed and looked away.

"No, no, no. Don't deflect." Lance said as they all leaned toward Keith.

Pidge rested her head on her steepled hands. "Tell us more about James, Keith."

Keith looked around, trying hard not to meet anyone's gaze. Then he sighed. "I pronounce it 'jiff'."

"Aw man, what?"

***

"Ina, thanks for coming!" Holt's smile was wide and genuine.

Leifsdottir nodded, closing the door behind her. Holt had asked for her - by name - to come by and pick up the notes she'd made on the MFEs. It didn't necessarily mean anything, Holt could just associate her with the project, but Leifsdottir was not going to pass up an opportunity to see her again.

She... liked the way Holt looked when she smiled.

Holt cleared a few things from her very messy bedside table and pulled three notebooks from a pile. Many colored tabs stuck out from the pages.

"So, these are my notes so far. Basic mechanical stuff, minor tweaks, ideas for upgrades, and some material alternatives we might be able to get from the rest of the Alliance." She gave the notebooks to Leifsdottir, who opened the first one to flip through it. Holt had also noticed the megathruster/dynotherm connection in her own notes.

"This is very thorough." Leifsdottir flipped to a page with a complete overhaul for the cockpit. More efficient, perhaps, but it was clear Holt didn't learn to fly on an Earthling jet fighter.

Holt shrugged, proud. "One thing I noticed, though, was that all of the performance notes were from an outside, on-the-ground perspective. I was hoping you might have some observations of your own?"

She had no idea what she had just unleashed. Leifsdottir took a seat and flipped the notebook back to page 1. "A few."

***

With drills over, Leifsdottir leaned against her MFE, writing her newest observations in a notepad. Being the one not moving, naturally the team converged on her.

"Whatcha writing, Leif?" Rizavi asked as she got close.

"Performance notes." Leifsdottir glanced at the reflex engines. "I thought of some more during the drill."

A wide, cheshire grin formed on Rizavi's face. "For your little project with Sergeant Holt?"

"It's her project. I'm just helping."

Rizavi leaned closer. "Helping a lot, I bet."

"What are we talking about?" Griffin asked as he and Kinkade joined them.

"Leifsdottir's writing notes for her girlfriend." Rizavi teased in a sing-song voice.

"Come on, Rizavi. Leifsdottir's not hooking up with Holt." James glanced in Leifsdottir's direction, "Are you?"

"...Unlikely."

"Unlikely? Is she straight?"

Now all three of them were looking at her. Leifsdottir closed her notepad and breathed. "Preliminary research suggests she's asexual. It's unlikely she would want to be in a relationship with me."

Griffin's eyebrows lowered. "What do you want?"

Leifsdottir pictured Holt's face in her mind, smiling like she does when she's focused on a project she loves, when she's explaining something complicated to someone who understands everything she says.

"I really want to kiss her face."

"Leif, you're a catch." Griffin said, looking her in the eyes. "You could have any girl you want."

Rizavi made an uncertain sound with an expression to match.

"What the hell?" Griffin turned on her, "Rizavi, she dated _you!_ "

"For all of twelve mintues-" Rizavi caught herself, "No. No. Leif, I support you in this. If anyone is a match for Holt, it's you."

Leifsdottir was about to argue against it when she felt Kinkade's steady, reassuring hand on her shoulder.

"You won't know until you try." He said.

Leifsdottir took a deep breath. "You're right. I should at least try."

"Atta girl!" Rizavi smacked her on the back. "Now let's get some grub, I'm starving."

As they walked together toward the cafeteria, Griffin said, "Honestly, I still haven't gotten over the fact Gunderson was a girl this whole time. It's unreal."

***

"So she brought in a folder with all of her new notes, and it was color-coded. So I thought, 'first thing I gotta do is figure out her color-system', right? Exept, I'm looking at it, and it's _my_ system. She learned my color system and used it for her own data."

Hunk turned away from the screen in surprise. "Pidge, that's huge!"

Immediately, he died.

"Aw, dang it. You're up, Romelle."

The three of them, Pidge, Hunk, and Romelle, were hanging in the lounge area, playing a videogame. Lance would be joining them after his check-up today, but hadn't made it yet.

Romelle took the controller and Hunk turned back to Pidge. "I'm serious, that's huge."

"I know."

"I mean, I would never do that for you. Because your system is garbage. The colors are completely arbitrary."

Pidge scowled. "I don't want to get into this right now."

"Right, sorry." Hunk smiled. "Tell me more about Ina."

"Shes's great." Pidge leaned back in her chair and looked off into space. "We talk about the MFEs, but we also talk about _everything_. What happened in space, what happened on Earth, our families, science, math, video games, and she _gets me_ , Hunk. Like, the way you get me, except also she's pretty."

"I'm hearing a lot of facts, Pidge," Hunk leaned over on his elbow, "and not a lot of feelings. How do you _feel?_ "

"Ugh." Pidge stuck out her tongue.

"I know, I know. This is gonna be hard for you, buddy, but you gotta power through it. Now, as your friend, tell me how she makes you feel."

Romelle, keeping her eyes on the screen, leaned back to listen better.

Pidge sighed, closing her eyes. "Happy. I think. I like when she's around, but I also feel nervous, because I want to impress her, but she's smart enough that I don't know if I can. But I'm comfortable? Like, I'm nervous and I'm comfortable at the same time. Or maybe I'm nervous, but not enough to make me uncomfortable. Like it's a good nervous."

Pidge shook her head, that didn't make any sense. "And I get distracted when she's around, like I want to focus on her more than the project. She smiled once, while we were talking, and it was like my whole system shut down. I couldn't see or hear anything else. I couldn't even respond for almost a minute."

Romelle paused the game, a flagrant violation of the terms they'd agreed to, and turned her full attention to Pidge. "Well, I think the situation is obvious."

Hunk nodded.

"Don't say it." If they said it, it would be real, and Pidge would have to confront it.

"You're in love!" They said it together.

"Augh!" Pidge put her hands to her face and let the rest of her body go limp. "How dare you be so cheerful about my world ending."

"Pidge, no, this is a good thing." Romelle said.

Hunk chuckled, "It's about the best thing that's ever happened to me."

Pidge growled at him.

"So, when do you ask her out?" Romelle asked.

"What? No!" Pidge sat up. "I can't do that!"

"Pidge, you have to! You're in love!"

"I don't do relationships, Romelle. I'm not... I'm not designed for them."

"Pidge, come on." Hunk put a hand on her shoulder, "Everybody deserves love. You don't want to spend the rest of your life wondering what could have been."

"Maybe if I ignore it, this feeling will go away." Pidge offered.

"Do you want it to go away?"

"...No."

"See? So you have to ask her out. You owe it to yourself, you owe it to Ina, and you owe it to me. Because I really want to tease you about your girlfriend."

"But... what if I tell her and she doesn't feel the same? What if I make things weird between us?"

"You were blushing the whole time you were talking about her." Romelle pointed out, "Who knows how much you've done it around her. And you go catatonic when she smiles. Goodness forbid she ever say your first name."

"She's right, Pidge. Things are already weird between you."

"Nooooo." Pidge whined.

Hunk sighed. "Look, we can't make you do anything-"

"We can't?"

"-but we're your friends, and we want you to be happy. We think this would be really good for you."

Romelle nodded in agreement.

Pidge groaned, trying to rub the embarassment out of her face. "I'll think about it, okay?"

"Excellent!" Romelle smiled and picked the controller back up.

"That's all we can ask."

Lance entered, then. "Hey, guys. What'd I miss?"

"Pidge is in love!" Romelle blurted.

"Pidge is _what?!_ "

Pidge covered her face with a pillow and screamed.

***

"We're getting discharged from the hospital soon." Pidge said. "Returning to active duty. It's going to be nice to see Green again."

"That means you'll have real assignments again." Leifsdottir glanced at the now very impressive list of tweaks and upgrades, both minor and major, that they'd compiled. "I suppose this endeavor has come to an end."

"Yeah..." Pidge looked with a bittersweet expression at the now seven folders of recommendations. She was satisfied with the work they'd done, but...

"Pidge-" "Leif-"

They'd spoken at the same time. Leifsdottir withdrew slightly and nodded for Pidge to speak.

"I've... really enjoyed spending time with you." Pidge looked at her fidgeting hands, acutely aware that her cheeks were hot. "I was hoping we... could keep doing that."

She glanced up to see Leifsdottir looking at her with appraising focus.

"I would like that." Leifsdottir said, cautiously. "I have leave on Thursdays, if you would like to get lunch."

"That sounds great!"

A quiet moment passed between them.

"Just so we're clear," Pidge said, "this is a date, right? Because I meant it as a date."

"I also meant it as a date, yes." Leifsdottir nodded.

"Cool."

Leifsdottir took a step closer. "If we're dating now, would it be too early to ask if I could kiss you?"

Pidge moved a bit closer herself. "No, I don't think it's too early."

Leifsdottir leaned down and moved a lock of hair behind Pidge's ear. "Then, may I kiss you?"

"You may."

Leifsdottir leaned down further and Pidge pushed herself up on her toes until their lips met. It was a nervous, almost chaste kiss, neither of them completely sure where their own or each other's boundaries were. But there was catharsis in it, as the tensions between them melted.

When the kiss broke, Leifsdottir was smiling. "I look forward to doing that again."

A crooked smile broke out on Pidge's face too. "Yeah."

Leifsdottir's communicator beeped and Griffin's voice said, "Leifsdottir, we need you at the hangar."

Leifsdottir pulled it up, "Understood." Then, to Pidge, she said, "I'll see you Thursday."

"Wouldn't miss it for the world."


End file.
